GUEST SPEAKERS
Our business program invites guest speakers each year to share their professional knowledge and experience with our students. Some are celebrities, some are not, but all are hugely important. If you may have a guest speaker that can benefit our business students, please email eaglebiz@chaminade.org with information and we will follow up with you.
From leadership to finance to ethics, here are some past and yearly guest speakers:
Derek Fisher
Who's Next is up to you. Email us if you have a contact that students would enjoy!
A long time National Basketball Associaition (NBA) player, Derek is currently the head coach of the New York Knicks. He played professionally for 18 seasons, spending the majority of his career with the Los Angeles Lakers, with whom he won five NBA championships. He has also served as president of the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA). Fisher is the all-time NBA record holder in playoff games played. While playing for the Lakers, he hit a buzzer beater with 0.4 seconds left in game 5 of the 2004 Western Conference Semifinals against the San Antonio Spurs, which the NBA lists as the 18th-greatest playoff moment of all time. He hit this shot two weeks after speaking to Mr. Gideon's students.
Sinbad
Kaley
Cuoco-Sweeting
Kaley first came to attention for her role as Bridget Hennessy on the ABC sitcom 8 Simple Rules (2002–2005). Cuoco later starred as Billie Jenkins on the final season of the supernatural drama series Charmed (2005–2006). She has gained recognition for her role as Penny on the CBS comedy series The Big Bang Theory (2007–present) for which she won a Critics' Choice Television Award. Cuoco has also appeared in the films To Be Fat like Me (2007), The Penthouse (2010), and Hop (2011).
An award-winning stand-up comedian and actor, Sinbad became well known in the 1990s from being featured on his own HBO specials. He has appeared on several television series, and starred in many films, including Necessary Roughness, Houseguest, First Kid, Jingle All the Way and Good Burger. Most notably, he starred in A Different World (a spin off of the Cosby Show) and The Sinbad Show.
Jenny
Johnson-Jordan
Johnson Jordan played volleyball for UCLA from 1991 to 1995 and was a two-time team captain for the Bruin women's volleyball team (1994-1995). She was a member of the 1991 UCLA National Championship squad, as well as the NCAA runner-up teams from '92 and '94, earning All-Tournament Team honors in 1994. Johnson Jordan earned a pair of Volleyball Magazine All-American Honorable Mention accolades in 1994 and '95. She was also a two-time All-Pac-10 Conference First Team honoree ('93 and '95) and a two-time Pac-10 All-Academic selection.
Following her playing days at UCLA, Johnson Jordan played with partner and former Bruin Annett (Buckner) Davis, finishing fifth in the Sydney Olympic Games. Elsewhere on the beach, Johnson Jordan has played on the Pro 4's, FIVB, WPVA, BVA and AVP Tours. A winner of 10 professional beach titles worldwide, Johnson Jordan ranked in the Top 10 in points every year she competed on the BVA and AVP Tours and was honored in 2002 with the AVP Special Achievement Award.
Johnson Jordan is married to former UCLA All-American wide receiver Kevin Jordan (class of '95).
Michael Faught
Mr. Faught, Clinical Assistant Professor of Entrepreneurship at LMU, has a 30+ year career in investment banking, investment management and technology start-up formation and management. He founded and successfully exited Technology Capital Partners, a venture-buyout partnership focused on technology-driven leveraged buyouts. Subsequently, Mr. Faught founded the Los Angeles Chapter of Social Venture Partners, a venture-philanthropy partnership focused on charter schools. In 2004, Mr. Faught co-chaired the Los Angeles Venture Capital Association (LAVA) Investment Capital Conference.
Most recently, he was President, Interim Chief Financial Officer and Board Member of VoxOx Inc., a San Diego-based unified communications start-up. Besides teaching at LMU, Mr. Faught is currently working with various LA public high schools to launch Los Angeles Business & Finance Academy, a four-year business, finance and entrepreneurship high school. Mr. Faught, a two-time Division I lacrosse All America and All Ivy selection, grew up in Italy and returned to the United States fluent in Italian and French.
Lisa Leslie
Lisa's talk to Chaminade students can be viewed on the Eagle Business YouTube Channel. She is a Hall of Fame former American professional women's basketball player who played in the WNBA. She is a three-time WNBA MVP and a four-time Olympic gold medal winner. The number seven pick in the 1997 inaugural WNBA draft, she followed a superb career at USC with seven WNBA All-Star appearances and two WNBA championships over the course of eleven seasons with the Los Angeles Sparks, before retiring in 2009. Leslie, a 6'5" center, is the first player to dunk in a WNBA game. She was considered a pioneer and cornerstone of the league during her WNBA career. In 2011, she was voted in by fans as one of the Top 15 players in WNBA history.
Dan Glick
Mr. Glick is a Chaminade parent who has been a valuable advisor for several aspiring Eagle Business entrepreneurs. He gives selflessly of his time and expertise inspiring our students and connecting them to resources necessary for success. As a successful financial fraud investigator, he also provides crucial insight to our students on the important of business ethics.
Mr. Glick is the principal for an advisory firm dedicated to servicing the small and middle market business community. Since 1986, his firm has provided advisory and financing solutions to facilitate the client’s growth, turnaround, sale, complex negotiations, fraud identification and remediation or acquisition. Glick's clients range from start up companies to those with revenue in excess of $300 million per year.
Glick's firm is active in advising clients through the above processes and offer Advisory Solutions to help Clients to help with their operational, financial, organizational and generational goals.
Alexa PenaVega
Alexa became known worldwide in 2001 for her role as Carmen Cortez in Spy Kids. The first Spy Kids film was a huge success, and subsequently two sequels, Spy Kids 2: The Island of Lost Dreams and Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over were filmed. During the shooting of the three films, she performed most of her own stunts. Vega reprised the role in the 2011 sequel, Spy Kids: All the Time in the World. In 2004, Vega finished filming two films: Sleepover and State's Evidence. Then the following year she starred in the Lifetime television film entitledOdd Girl Out as a victim of cyber-bullying. Vega played Wick in the 2012 film The Devil's Carnival,
Rob Schneider
After graduating from high school, Rob set out on the club circuit to pursue a career in comedy. His combination of self-deprecating humor and goofball antics earned him rave reviews, and he was soon opening for the likes of Jay Leno and Jerry Seinfeld. Schneider got his big break in 1990, when Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels hired him on as a writer for the show. Soon, he was performing his own material and was a cast regular until 1994 when he left to pursue his film career.
Schneider appeared in two successful Adam Sandler vehicles, The Waterboy (1998) and Big Daddy (1999). He then landed the lead role in Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo, as a fish tank cleaner who assumes the identity of a high-living gigolo. He also starred in The Animal in 2001. Reuniting with Adam Sandler, Schneider had a small role in You Don't Mess With the Zohan (2008). He has completed several film projects, which are awaiting release. The Chosen One marks his second directorial effort, and he also co-wrote the script and stars in the film.
Jen Kushell
Jennifer Kushell is the President of Young & Successful Media and founder of YSN.com (“Your Success Network”), a leading destination for career exploration, professional development, tools and resources for young professionals and entrepreneurs around the world. Author of the NY Times Bestseller, Secrets of the Young & Successful and The Young Entrepreneur's Edge, Kushell started her entrepreneurial career at 13. Today she works with a wide range of corporations, trade associations and universities and as a speaker and strategic consultant and is a recognized thought leader on the emerging global workforce.
Called “The Career Doctor” by Cosmopolitan and a “guru” of her generation’s entrepreneurial movement by US News & World Report, Kushell has appeared in front of over 300 million people via major media such as CNN, CNBC, BBC, NPR, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, BusinessWeek, Entrepreneur, and Seventeen.
Garry Marshall
As a consummate producer, most of Mr. Marshall's hit TV shows were created and executive produced by him. His first producing assignment came with Hey, Landlord in 1966. He stepped up the very next year, producing The Lucy Show. Then came successes in producing The Odd Couple, Laverne and Shirley, Blansky's Beauties, Mork & Mindy, Angie, and Happy Days.
Marshall went on to focus on directing feature films, with a series of hits, such as Beaches, Pretty Woman, The Princess Diaries, and most recently Valentine's Day and New Year's Eve. Mr. Marshall was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame in 1997.
Fred Ulrich
Dennis Smith
Smith played high school football as a wide receiver and defensive back at Santa Monica High School (Samohi). He was the CIF Southern Section Co-Player of the Year in 1976. Smith was a consensus All-America choice as a senior at USC in 1980. He played in two Rose Bowls for the USC Trojans. He played in a secondary which included 3 future NFL All-Pros: himself, the San Francisco 49ers' Ronnie Lott, and the Minnesota Vikings' Joey Browner. Smith was a consensus All-America choice and is a member of the USC team that won the national championship in 1978.
Smith established himself as one of the most feared and hardest hitting safeties in the NFL and was voted to play in six Pro Bowls (following the 1985-1986, 1989–1991 and 1993 seasons), was named All-AFC in 1984 and 1988, played on three Broncos Super Bowl teams (XXI, XXII, XXIV), and was named All-Pro 4 times. Smith’s career totals include 1,171 tackles, 30 interceptions and 15 sacks. He posted a career- high five interceptions in 1991.
A Chaminade parent, Mr. Ulrich graduated from West Point with a BS, served four years in the military including a one year tour in Vietnam, and graduated from the Harvard Business School. From 1972 to 1982, he was a member of the corporate finance and merger and acquisition departments of Morgan Stanley & Co. and Warburg Paribas Becker where he worked on billions of dollars of financings and mergers. Between 1982 and 2002, Mr. Ulrich was the CEO of boutique merchant banks formed to pursue leveraged buyouts and new ventures. Under his leadership these entities raised hundreds of millions of dollars to finance acquisitions.
Mr. Ulrich advised the companies he co-founded on over one hundred transactions including acquisitions, divestures, financings, public offerings, management changes. Mr. Ulrich has also worked with development stage ventures including The Oz Entertainment Company, Sysdome Corporation, Year Disc. He has been a director of fifteen companies including two that were taken public and has served as the CFO of two companies. From 2002 to 2010, he served on the board of directors of The San Jose Water Company, a publicly traded company that provides water to the city of San Jose.
Bruce Gumbiner
Mr. Gumbiner has been a valuable financial advisor for Chaminade students. He is a Community Reinvestment Act Officer at Community Bank in Los Angeles, and is teaching the FDIC’s Money Smart financial education curriculum in conjunction with Junior Achievement and The Los Angeles Mission (the Mission), a nonprofit organization that is among the nation’s largest service providers to the homeless. The Mission hosts a program known as the Urban Training Institute (UTI), which provides rehabilitation services intended to help individuals devastated by homelessness and/or substance abuse to navigate back into the mainstream of society. The UTI offers a six-class series on financial literacy, and most of UTI’s clients are unbanked or underbanked individuals who may also need credit repair. Community Bank is the bank used by Chaminade College Prep.